


Show Me A Garden That's Bursting Into Life

by pumpkinbloods



Series: aren't you curious? [5]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Character Study, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov Friendship, Clint Barton Feels, Depression, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Hallucinations, Hurt Clint Barton, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I'm Sorry, Memories, Natasha Romanov Feels, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Recovery, Red Room (Marvel), Spoilers, Survivor Guilt, This too shall pass, Wanda Maximoff & Clint Barton Friendship, What Happened in Budapest, grief is a complicated emotion, grief is a process, this hurt to write
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 20:09:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18724096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pumpkinbloods/pseuds/pumpkinbloods
Summary: He took a few careful steps forward. She gave him a heavy expression. “This isn’t real. I’m already gone.”She took a step forward, falling down and out of sight. Clint screamed until he felt Laura’s cool hand on his forehead. Her voice telling him to wake up. That it was just a dream.Clint is mourning. Nat is everywhere. How do you let go when you're not ready but they are?





	Show Me A Garden That's Bursting Into Life

**Author's Note:**

> ENDGAME SPOILERS
> 
> the title is from the song chasing cars by snow patrol. i wanted to write clint grieving nat because marvel didn't do it. this is sad but somewhat hopeful. enjoy.

The first time he dreams about her, it’s a hazy memory and he wakes up in bewilderment.

It’s something simple, just a dream of them training. It was early, only a few months after they met. She always trained alone, ate alone, lived alone, did everything alone.

She was standing still on the top of the building. Her red hair blew in the wind, she was growing out her bangs. They were at an awkward length where she couldn’t tuck it behind her ears but it still fell in her eyes, she mostly kept it held back with headbands. Now, it was down. She wasn’t wearing a coat despite the chilling breeze.

“Are you okay?” he had asked.

She had turned around sharply, eyes earnest and confused. “I don’t know.”

Clint woke up seconds later, Laura was still asleep next to him. The kids were still in their rooms, the window was still open, curtains floating up like ghosts.

 _She’s gone,_ Clint tells himself. _She’s not here anymore._

He rolls over in bed, throwing an arm over his sleeping wife. He tries to get comfortable, kicking off part of the duvet. He glances at the doorway, to see her leaning on the frame, frowning. He can almost hear her. He shut his eyes tightly.

 _Go to bed, Clint,_ she would say. _Everyone needs their rest._

 _Why aren’t you in bed then,_ he’d snip back. And she’d smile, just like she always would, before reaching out a hand to help him up off the floor, or couch, or chair, or training room mats, anywhere but the bed, where he was supposed to be sleeping.

 _Go,_ she’d push. She wouldn’t answer his comeback, just force him to bed. _Get some sleep._ _Good night._

 _Goodnight, Nat,_ he’d answer. And she’d watch to make sure he’d actually go to bed.

When he opened his eyes, she was gone.

* * *

 

The next morning, he wakes up early and sits on the front steps. Watching the sunrise and the animals wake up, watching the world move.

 _Go back to fucking bed,_ she’d hiss when he’d wake up at four am instead of seven or eight. _Go._

 _I can’t rest,_ he’d sigh back.

_None of us can. But we still sleep._

* * *

 

The second time he sees her, Laura and the kids are in town, shopping and Clint had stayed behind because he was coming down with a nasty bug.

He walks into the kitchen in sweats and a shirt, rubbing his tired eyes and shuffling his feet as he made some fucking tea Laura had told him to drink. _Tea._

She was sitting at the kitchen table, legs crossed and elbow on the table, resting her head on her hand. She was watching him move, an amused expression on her face.

 _So,_ she’d said, or Clint thought she’d said. He was sick and everything seemed distant. _Tea?_

Clint sighed, turning his back to grab a mug from the cupboard. “Laura said it will help,” he answered to no one. Or her. Or the air. Or the idea of her. Or-

 _Help what,_ she questioned.

“My-” Clint almost answered, turning around to see that she was gone. The room fell a few degrees colder. The kettle shrieked, he could almost hear her laugh.

* * *

 

The third time, he fell asleep on the couch after a night of no sleep whatsoever.

She was crying in this one, softly and slowly. Shoulders shaking and hands covering her face. This is the first time he had ever seen her cry. They had known each other for nearly two goddamn years, he was there when she got shot, but he had never seen her cry.

Clint had set next to her, putting an arm around her shaking shoulders. She leaned away from it, and he understood. Touching, delicate, soft, kind, caring, beautiful, touching Nat had never known. Every touch she knew had force behind it. It held horror.

“What happened?” he whispered after a few minutes, not looking at her. Hearing her ragged breaths, quiet sobs, one of her hands was now on her thigh, rubbing it worriedly. The other one was covering her crying eyes.

She brought her hands to her sides, clenching them into fists. Her hair made curtains around her face, he could hardly hear her.

“I’m _sad,"_  she said, voice terribly young and raspy. “I’m _scared."_

He reached for her hand, putting an open palm over her shaking fist. She flinched but didn’t move away. Uncurled her fist and twined their hands together.

She kept crying, and he stayed sitting next to her the whole time.

Clint woke up to Cooper shaking his shoulder, “go to bed, dad.”

He fumbles up the steps, kicks off his jeans and chucks his shirt onto the floor. He hears the shower in the bedroom bathroom turn on. Clint falls into bed.

Her sobs shake the core of his being, everything seems heavier with her gone.

He’s _scared_ too.

* * *

 

_Let me go._

Every dream, she falls. Down, down, down.

Every dream, he can never save her.

_It’s okay._

If he could answer her now, press their forehead together and let out a sob, he’d tell her the truth.

_I can’t. It’s not. Please._

* * *

 

The next time it happens, he’s sleeping next to Laura while she does a crossword. Lila has a friend over, Cooper and Nathaniel play football outside.

“Nat?”

She turned around in the field, the field she had always loved, her white dress floating around her. She smiled gently at Clint. Her hair was short, pixie cut. She always said she wanted to cut it short, but she never did. Now, it was short and she was wearing that dress that she never wore.

“What are you doing here?”

She smiles and reaches for his hand, watching as he moves a few steps closer.

“I’m waiting for you.”

* * *

 

“Sweetheart,” Laura says before bed one night. “I’m worried about you.”

Clint freezes while brushing his teeth, looking over at Laura. “Why?”

“You’ve been talking in your sleep,” she tells him, leaning against the bathroom doorway. “It’s always the same few sentences.”

“I’m okay, babe. I am.”

“I don’t believe you,” she murmurs from the doorway. Her eyes worried. “I know it’s hard but maybe-”

“I don’t want to talk about this,” Clint says abruptly. “Not now.”

“Clint, please.”

“Not now. Just- not. Not now.”

Laura frowns, watching as Clint walks out of the bathroom. For a second, not even, he swears Nat is in the bathroom mirror, watching him walk away.

* * *

 

She was standing on the edge of her floors balcony. Wearing pajamas, no shoes and her hair was floating around her. She was looking down, down, down.

“Nat.”

“Yeah?” she answered, still looking down.

“Don’t do this,” he said. “Don’t jump. Don’t do this. Please.”

She didn’t answer, she just looked over at him. Eyes welling with tears and mouth frowning. “Clint.”

He took a few careful steps forward. She gave him a heavy expression. “This isn’t real. I’m already gone.”

She took a step forward, falling down and out of sight. Clint screamed until he felt Laura’s cool hand on his forehead. Her voice telling him to wake up. That it was just a dream.

* * *

 

Clint wakes up one night to screaming, he rolls out of bed, follows the screams to Lila’s room.

“Baby, Lila, what’s wrong? What happened? Are you hurt?” Clint rambles, crouching down next to her on the bed, pushing sweaty hair from her face.

Lila sat up quickly, wrapping her arms around her father's shoulders. Sobbing, she said something that Clint couldn’t make out.

“Shh, it’s okay, sweetie. It’s okay,” Clint soothed, petting her hair and rubbing her back. “It’s okay now. It’s okay. It was just a dream.”

“Was it though?” his daughter sobbed back. And Clint didn't know how to answer.

* * *

 

“How’re you doing?” Clint asked Wanda over lunch once. She was living alone now, in an apartment near a cafe.

“Okay,” she said, sipping a glass of water. “Better. How are you?”

“Fine.”

“You’re terrible at lying,” Wanda told him, looking at Clint with the shadow of a smile. She pointed her fork at him, “what’s wrong?”

“It’s hard to explain,” Clint sighed.

“Try.”

“I keep,” he took a sharp intake of air. “I keep seeing her. Or dreaming about her. Or both. It’s hard to explain, but she’s everywhere.”

Wanda thought for a second, “you’re mourning, Clint.”

Clint waved her away, “that doesn’t matter. She’s been gone for a while now. I should be over this.”

“There is no _getting over this._ There is only moving through this. Grief is a process.”

“Well, I’m done with that process. I’m over it,” Clint snapped back. Taking a bite of his meal. “I’m done with her and the grief.”

From a table over, Nat, drinking a cocktail and smiling with something that wasn’t real. “You’re not done with me. I’m still here, aren’t I?”

* * *

 

He was restless. Tired. He got sleep, but she was in nearly every dream. Falling down, letting go, saying goodbye. In old memories, new ones, mixed of both. But she was there, without fail. There was no rest.

“You need rest, Clint,” Nat told him while he started a load of laundry one afternoon. “Get some rest.”

He slammed the washing machine shut, “It’s your fault.”

“Bullshit. Don’t blame me for you not processing your emotions.” She followed him out of the room. “I’m not even here. You’re imagining me. Don’t act like I did this. I have _nothing_ to do with this. _Nothing."_

(He knows Nat wouldn’t talk like this. She was better than that. She would be more sympathetic but…)

“You’re the one that fucking died!”

“Who’re you talking to, babe?” Laura asked from the steps. Clint froze and looked at his wife, her eyes were filled with concern and curiosity.

“Nobody,” Clint answered, looking from his wife to where Nat was standing. But she was gone.

* * *

 

He started to avoid her, stopped thinking about all the memories they had together. How his youngest son was named after her. How she was still everywhere, everything he looked at was tainted with grief.

“This isn’t gonna work,” the grief of Nat told him when he avoided looking at the photo of Nat, Laura and the kids in the kitchen. “There is no way to avoid me. There is no way to act like I never existed. We both know.”

Clint turned and gave the death of her a cold shoulder, walking away from her with fists clenched tightly.

“I’m grieving too, Clint.”

* * *

 

So. He was avoiding her. And it didn’t work. At fucking all.

“When is this gonna end? How much longer?”

“I don’t know, Nat.”

* * *

 

He walked to her, looking at the side of her face. “What’re you doing here, Clint?”

“Nothing,” he answered. “Just thought I’d visit.”

“Don’t lie to me, Clint,” Nat turned to him slowly. “Why are you here?”

“I’m sick of you, Nat.” Clint looked down at their feet, his boots, and her suit. “I can’t do this anymore.”

“You’re not ready yet, Clint,” he told him. Then turned away from Clint, looking back at the distance. No matter how hard he tried, Clint couldn’t get her attention.

* * *

 

“So,” Wanda crossed her arms and looked at Clint with raised eyebrows. “There’s a support group in town. Would you like to go?”

Clint ran a hand over his face, sighed and grabbed a jacket from the coat rack. “Let’s go.”

Nat sat in the backseat the whole way, looking out the window, gently bobbing her head to the music.

* * *

 

The support group was fine, they all sat in a circle in fold-out metal chairs. There was cheap coffee and slightly stale donuts. The people were nice, they all talked for a few minutes at a time and a few of them welled up. The leader of the group, Sarah, was cool. She had a clipboard in her lap all the time.

“I’m just… upset,” a girl said, her name was Avery, she couldn’t have been more than twenty-five, she looked so youthful. “He died so young, it wasn’t just a loss of life. It was a loss of chances. A loss of kids, and jobs, and ideas and laughter and tears. He’s gone and there’s no way to bring him back.”

Nat sat in one of the empty chairs across the room, “aren’t you gonna talk? Tell everyone how your dead best friend follows you around, showing you how she never got a happy ending?”

Clint clenched his jaw, looked away from Nat and back at Avery.

“There’s no way to let him know everything that he could’ve had.”

* * *

 

He went to the support group every week with Wanda. There were a few regulars, people who went there every week. Some went once and Clint never saw them again. By the third week, Clint was talking in the group.

“It’ll be a year next Sunday,” Clint said once, picking at the skin by his fingernails. “It seems longer and shorter at the same time. I’ve been counting the days she’s been gone, but it seems like she only… _died_ yesterday. I don’t know. Since she’s been gone time has been all screwy.”

Nat crossed her arms and cocked her head, “time has always been fucked up for you, Clint. But I always remembered to wear a watch.”

Clint ignored her, continued to talk. “Everything seems to be happening around me while I stay still.”

Nat rolled her eyes the way she always did, “maybe it’s time for you to move.”

* * *

 

A random memory comes up while Clint is in the waiting room at the dentist with Cooper.

“Whaddya want?” Clint asked, looking at the menu, back at Nat. She was looking at the menu with a blank face. “Do you know?”

Nat shook her head, “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” Clint pushed a glass of water toward her. “It’s okay not to know.”

Nat says nothing, just looks at the water with confused eyes.

“You’ll have a grilled cheese, everyone likes grilled cheeses.”

Nat hates the grilled cheese, she doesn’t tell him that, but Clint can tell. He gives her his burger, she likes that more. They had known each other for less than two weeks, but Clint was learning. And so was she.

* * *

 

“How’d she die?” the girl- Avery, asks one day after group. Wanda is getting them coffee, talking to another person in the group.

Avery is leaning against the side of the building, smoking a cigarette. She looked like something out of a bad teen movie.

“What?” Clint muttered, watching as Avery took another drag.

“Your girl. How’d she die?”

Clint shook his head, “she wasn’t my girl. We weren’t… like that. She was just a close friend of mine.”

“She was your girl, in a way,” Avery ashed her cigarette. “How’d she die though? Cancer? Car crash?”

“She fell,” Clint crossed his arms over his chest. “How’d yours die?”

“Suicide,” Avery took another drag, blowing it out slowly. “he’ll be gone for six months tomorrow.”

“I’m sorry for-”

Avery shook her head, “don’t do that. Don’t say that. I’m so sick of that. My husband kills himself and everyone is always saying sorry. Don’t be one of those people.”

“You shouldn’t smoke,” Clint ignores what she said and points at the cigarette in between her fingers.

“I know,” Avery threw the cigarette on the ground and stepped on it. “I’ve been meaning to quit for a long time.”

“Why don’t you?” Clint asks as Avery pushes herself off the wall.

“Well,” Avery shrugged. “It’s hard to let go of things.”

She nodded to him and smiled, “I’ll see you next week, Clint.”

Avery walks to a car, getting inside and driving away. Nat stands next to him the whole goddamn time.

* * *

 

Clint lives his life as he always would, with Laura and the kids and his life. He falls asleep next to his wife every night, kisses her every morning. He helps Lila aim right, he helps Nathaniel with his math and Cooper with his- whatever the hell Cooper needs help with.

She still haunts his dreams, haunts him around the house. Everywhere. But it was fine. He was… slowly moving through it.

The next week at support group, he approaches Avery. She turns to him and smiles, taking out a cigarette.

“Would you like to get a coffee? I came here late and all the shitty coffee was gone.”

Avery nods, Wanda didn’t come this week. She was home sick with something like the flu. Avery moved her hand out in front of her, toward the door. Nat follows them out.

* * *

 

They don’t get coffee, but they buy icees from the gas station down the street and sit outside, on the curb. She sits with her legs out, ankles crossed and dangly earrings swaying each time she moved.

“So,” Avery started, taking a sip from her red and white icee. Clint watched a car slow to a stop in the near empty street. “What do you need to talk about?”

“Do you ever-” Clint paused and poked at his drink. “Do you ever see him? Like, in dreams or just around?”

Avery took the lid off of her cup and stirred the drink so she could drink it easier. “All the time. I’ll wake up and think he’s still in bed with me. But he’s not.”

Before Clint can talk again, Avery speaks. “My turn to ask you a question.”

Clint nods, taking a drink from the half melted icee.

“How’d she fall?”

Clint froze, feeling suddenly bare. He took a breath and told Avery. How Nat fell, how she let go.

* * *

 

“And,” Avery said after everything. “You keep seeing her? In dreams and memories and things like that?”

Clint nodded. Avery took out a cigarette and lit it.

“I don’t know what to tell you, Clint,” Avery sighed, taking a drag. “I’m always here to talk, though. Ask Sarah for my number and she’ll give it to you. I can’t say I know what you’re going through, but I can say you’re not going through it alone.”

* * *

 

Some time later, Clint and Avery were walking around after a meeating, drinking lukewarm coffee. 

“How’d he do it?” Clint asked, taking a drink of his coffee.

Avery finished hers, throwing it in a trashcan by a mailbox. She took out a cigarette, putting it in her mouth and stuffing her hands in her pockets.

“He jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge,” she said, words muffled by the cigarette in her mouth.

“Jesus,” Clint sighed, scrubbing a hand over his face. He quietly realized that both Nat and Avery's husband fell. 

Avery lit her cigarette, cupping her hands as she slowed down walking. Clint stopped next to her. She took it out of her mouth and exhaled, “yeah. I was mad at him for a long time.”

“Why?”

Avery furrowed her brows and took another drag, “cause he died.”

“Oh,” Clint murmured pathetically.

Avery nodded. She started to walk again, Clint followed her. They stopped at a crosswalk, Avery pushed the button under the stoplight.

“I haven’t driven over the bridge since then,” Avery shrugged. Turning towards him. “I will, sooner or later.”

Clint took another drink of his coffee while Avery smoked, he was getting used to it by now. Stopped coughing all the time. Nat walked up and stood next to Avery. Watching her blow the smoke at the ground.

“You ever forgive him?” Clint asked, looking at Nat.

The light changed and Nat walked in front of them, and Avery started to walk with Clint.

“Sure,” Avery looked away and watched Nat even though she couldn’t see her. “Yeah. That’s what you do when someone dies.”

* * *

 

He gets better. Slowly. He still sees her in places, mostly random dreams that were messy memories faded by time and nostalgia.

Avery and Clint talk about it, she tells him about her late husband, Lucas. And he tells Avery about Nat and sometimes Tony. But mostly Nat.

“I think this is gonna be my last one,” Avery says one night, sitting criss-cross on the picnic table in his yard. Cooper and Nathaniel are at their uncle's house while Laura and Clint went out. Lila stayed home, she had been refusing to stay home alone as of late. Avery said she could watch her. They came home to Avery playing with Lila’s hair while they watched some drama on Netflix.

Laura was inside and Lila was in bed, Clint was sitting on the actual bench while Avery sat atop the table.

“Really?”

Avery nodded, taking another drag. “Yeah. Maybe. Lila gave me like a twenty-minute lecture on how smoking is gonna kill me, my lungs are black, yadda, yadda, yadda…”

Clint laughed as Avery exhaled, “she’s a cool kid. I’d be happy to hang out with her whenever. It gets me out of the house, the only times I really leave is for group and work.”

“Why don’t you get out more?” Clint asked, watched as the smoke floated around them. Avery looked at the sky, the moon and the stars.

“I don’t know,” Avery sighed and ashed her cigarette. “It’s hard to live my life when he didn’t get to live his.”

* * *

 

Later, right before Avery leaves, as Clint walks her to her car, he asks the question that has been roaming around his head for some time now.

“You know why he did it?”

“Nope,” Avery exhaled, her cigarette was almost gone. “I don’t want to know either.”

“Why not?”

“I have my reasons,” Avery looked out, her hair blew in the wind. “It’s easier to not know, maybe in some time, I’ll think about it more. Look for answers. Right now I’m just looking for myself.”

Avery looked at him and smiled a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, flicked her cigarette on the ground and stepped on it, moving her foot roundly where the dirt crinkled under her shoe. She got into her car and started it, rolling down her window. “I’ll see you later, Clint. Have a good night.”

Avery drove away, and Clint watched her go. Nat stood next to him. She reached for his hand, and he let her hold it. Even if it was so cold.

* * *

 

He drives to Nat’s field. The one she loved when she was alive. The one she would go to when the world was going to shit, the only place Clint could see her truly happy.

The field surrounded a small lake, wildflowers scattered around and dry grass that went to his ankles. It wasn’t a nice place, but it was the only place Clint could think Nat would be.

And she was there. Standing at the lake, wearing an outfit that looked comfortable. That didn’t look like it was something Nat would be willing to get blood on. Leggings and a t-shirt with a jean jacket. She was wearing broken in boots, her hair was short and parted messily. She looked peaceful.

“You’re here,” she said it like she was expecting him. Like he was late.

* * *

 

“Yeah,” Clint nodded and stood next to Nat. “I’m here.”

“It took you long enough,” Nat smiled and so did Clint.

“Shut up.”

Nat laughed a little bit and cooled down quickly, “so. What do you want to say?”

“I don’t know. What do you want me to tell you?”

Nat furrowed her brows and looked out at the setting sun over the lake. “I want you to tell me the truth.”

* * *

 

He was supposed to kill her the first time they met, she was holding a gun and bodies were fallen around her, blood leaking onto the floor like some sort of fucked up carpet.

He walked inside the red room carefully, scoping his eyes over everything that was in sight. When he saw her, the red hair with the white walls. She turned towards him with a ready expression. Like she knew what was going on.

Her hands shook for half a second when she aimed her gun at him, and she didn’t look at him in the eyes.

Clint lowered his bow, and found her eyes quickly. Her eyes went wider and she lowered her gun slowly, so slowly. She searched his eyes for a moment that seemed like hours.

“It’s okay,” Clint had said. “It’s okay.”

* * *

 

“I-” Clint took a breath and looked up at the sky. It looked like a painting. “I don’t know what the truth is anymore.”

Nat smiled and shook her head, “why did it take you so long to get here?”

“I don’t- I don’t know,” Clint gritted his teeth and heard some waves from the lake hit rocks around it.

“Don’t lie to me,” Nat spoke. “You know. Why did it take you so long to get here?”

* * *

 

“I’m supposed to shoot anyone that gets too close,” Nat said in the red room. Firm accent, neat hair, she looked like something out of a spy movie.

“That’s okay,” Clint nodded, keeping his weapon down. “I won’t get close.”

Nat had looked surprised, “why?”

“‘Cause I don’t wanna hurt you. And I don’t want you to hurt me.”

* * *

 

“I didn’t want to let go of you,” Clint told Nat softly. “I don’t want to let go of you.”

Nat nodded and looked away, ran a hand through her hair. “I need you to, Clint.”

* * *

 

She didn’t sleep, Clint found that out quickly. On the plane back to New York, nearly everyone else on the slept while she stayed up and looked out the window. Each time something moved, even if it was the tiniest twitch, her head perked up and eyes searched everything around her.

“No one is gonna kill you, y’know. There’s no threats on this plane,” Clint told her opening his eyes slowly. 

She looked over at him with piercing eyes, “there is always a threat.”

* * *

 

“Do you remember,” Nat started, looking at Clint as he avoided eye contact. “What you told me when I got stabbed in Paris? When you had to clean the cut because the paramedics were taking too long?”

“I don’t wanna say that, Nat. I don’t wanna say that.”

Nat shook her head, “please. I’m tired. This isn’t where I belong anymore.”

* * *

 

Clint asks Nat why she didn’t kill him when they first met. Why she didn’t take her shot.

“You said killing anyone who got too close was your only priority,” Clint drew out, standing next to her as she stretched.

She sighed and looked up at him, “priorities change.”

* * *

 

“I know it hurts but it’s necessary,” Clint whispered. “That’s what I said. _I know it hurts but it’s necessary."_

“This is necessary, Clint,” Nat told him soothingly. “It is.”

Clint took a deep breath in and looked at Nat, “will I ever see you again?”

Nat smiled and laughed a little bit, “yeah. You will.”

“When?”

Nat shrugged, “eventually. You will. Eventually.”

* * *

 

“You know I love you, right?” Nat said, looking at him with a tilted head. “More than I ever thought I could love.”

Clint smiled, and wrapped an arm around her. And she leaned into it. Budapest was a bad, long mission, but this was okay.

* * *

 

“Are you ready?”

“No.”

Nat laughed and shook her head fondly, “I believe in you.”

Clint looked away for a moment, at the lake, at the wildflowers, at Nat. “I miss you.”

“I know,” Nat nodded. “I miss you too.”

* * *

 

She looked down, then back up. Her hand holding onto his wrist. “Let me go.”

He shook his head, “no. No. Please. No.”

She nodded and spoke in a raspy, broken voice, “it’s okay.”

He stumbled over his words, stuttered something. Then she pushed herself off, let go of him… and fell.

All he could hear was his scream and the loss of her life.

* * *

 

“You ready?”

“Not really.”

She grabbed his hand and squeezed it, lending him a watery smile. “It’s _okay."_

Nat let go of his hand and took a few steps back, walking away. She walked to the lake and Clint watched her.

Nat turned around and waved, smiling slightly. Clint lifted his hand and moved it, waving back. Then Nat walked into the water and Clint looked down. She was gone now. She was at rest.

Clint picked some flowers and held them in his hand. Walking back to his car, he heard the waves rest, stop crashing against the rocks harshly.

* * *

 

He drove home and went to bed, sleeping next to Laura. The wildflowers hung upside down in the window, the curtains floating up like ghosts.

Clint fell asleep, resting for the first time in a long, long, time. He wondered if Nat was resting too.

**Author's Note:**

> hope you all enjoyed!! kudos and comments warm my heart!!
> 
> [my tumblr!](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/hellotomyoldheart)
> 
> [my other tumblr!](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/exlosers)


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